Quoted:


Well the FIRST thing to do in the way of PREPARATION is to LEAVE Los Angeles.

Immediately.

The only survivors  in Los Angeles  will be cockroaches.

Quoted:
Just hope you're at Ground Zero" since you probably don't want to survive a major nuclear strike.

Stick your head between your knees, and "Kiss Your Ass Goodbye".

I used to live couple of miles from the Weapons Storage Facility in Seal Beach, CA. Was always kinda weird knowing we would be a major target.

Quoted:
I was watching this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBux––OXhMQ

This morning and realized my preps lean too heavily on zombie attack. The likelyhood of having to shelter in place is much more realistic.  As is illustrated in that video, bugging out will not work for a variety of reasons.

Quoted:


bad link? anyone have a correction?
hg

Quoted:
I don't know if this has been discussed before, sorry if duplicated...  Please post link if so...

scenario

background:
you are a SF-savvy guy with a wife and a 10 year old kid. your prep situation is pretty good; in the basement are a pair of 55gal blue drums of water, about 30 days of food of various sorts. the BOV is fueled at least 3/4 full, and there are 5 MFC's of gas on hand. there is a BOB for everyone –– even the 10 year old got a mini-BOB for his birthday last month.

situation:
it's a saturday. everyone is home doing chores and whatnot. a small nuke hidden in a railcar goes off 25 miles away. you know about this because the TV is on in the background, and cuts to a newsflash of the plume taken by a field reporter about 10 miles from ground zero. a couple of news anchors are on hand at the studio, babbling about stuff they don't yet know much about. offhand, you don't recall what the weather forecast is like, nor which direction the wind is prevailing from.

what are your 10 next moves?

––––––––––––––––

notes

as the OP, i would like to point out a few more things to think about...

(1) arguing over the yield is pointless. the device went off, and no one will know the approximate yield for days. moreover, the design yield and actual yield may be two completely different numbers; in other words, because of a defect in the design, the nuke was more or less a "dud" –– but the result is that there is increased radioactive (i.e., unfissioned) material in the plume.

(2) you should take into consideration others' reactions to such an event as part of your planning. there will be folks who stand in front of their TV's for the next two hours, and there will be folks who immediately jump in their cars to go "somewhere". the latter will, with 100% certainty, go in a direction away from the detonation. on a work or school day, office buildings will empty in minutes, parents will seek their children from school, and the weather i left as a huge variable. it could be snowing!

(3) in the basement, there is 30 days of water (110gals/3 people = 36gals per person, about 1.2gals per day –– certainly not a lot, but enough). there is also 30 days of food. for those of you that decided to BO, why are you leaving? what was your rationale which led you to that decision? did you consider there might be another nuclear device?

(4) at a range of 25 miles, with a nominal 10knot wind, you have about 2.5 hours to either hunker down or bug out. if you do not reach your BOL in ~2hrs, you will be "out in the open" per se, and subject to the whims of changing wind directions. i would add some way points along your BO route so that if you get hung up due to traffic, and won't reach you destination, you have someplace to hunker down.

(5) those of you who said you'd BI at the house –– how long to stay downstairs? did you remember to switch off the furnace and/or A/C systems? do you shut off the electric power at the panel? have you any plans for supplementary radiation barriers above the basement ceiling, etc?

(6) about 60 seconds after the news broadcast, utilization of the phone network (cell and wired) will skyrocket. it's unlikely that you will be able to reliably communicate –– this is exactly what happened in my AO during the 9/11 attacks. i could not get in touch with my brother nor brother-in-law, who were both at work in downtown NYC. basically, if CNN is showing a major "event" live, communications using phones will be sketchy. our phone networks are simply not engineered for everyone to talk to everyone at the same time.

––––––––––––––––

survival HOW-TO

here is a (simplistic) starting point:
http://www.ki4u.com/survive/index.htm

summary:

if you survive the initial detonation (i.e., you were far enough away such that the thermal pulse and blast wave had minimal effect), you simply need to deal with the "hot" but rapidly decaying fallout.

and, the way to do that is to hunker down in a shelter under as much earth, cement, and metal as you possibly can for a period of around 5-7 days.

see, for some details, http://www.radshelters4u.com/index3.htm#b2

if you do nothing other than look at the pictures in the above link, you'll be better off.

also see the "howto" shelter PDF's at the bottom of
http://www.military.com/Content/MoreContent1/?file=cw_civildefense

––––––––––––––––

so, i've spent a couple of evenings reading up on things associated with my scenario. attached at the bottom of this post will be some links which led me to the following steps.

(0) using an ink pen or marker, write on the inside of your forearm the time and date of the moment the nuke went off. this is T=0. for reasons which will become clear shortly, it is important to know how much time has elapsed since detonation. in a fallout shelter, without sunlight to run your biological clock, it might be easy to lose track of how many days have passed. with the T=0 info on your arm, and a wristwatch, you should not have that problem. if possible, record the distance to the explosion as well.

(1) the ONLY suitable reaction is to bug in, or in the worst case bug out to a *local* (<15 minute drive or walking distance) shelter specifically designed for fallout. some schools, many government buildings, and some corporate offices have suitable basement shelters. i'm sure you are imagining the post-Katrina Superdome right now. so am i. however, if you are not at home, and can't get home, a suitable shelter and a stocked in-vehicle BOB may save your life. (aside, i plan to map out the shelters nearby to my home and work locations.)

i got to the bug in conclusion as follows. almost everything i have read has indicated that with this type of event, mass panic would occur –– and many would flee their homes in a direction away from the event. the mother of all bug outs would swiftly be in progress. roads would quickly become jammed. errant news and rumors ("there may be another bomb" or "we are under attack") would cause more panic and potentially cause many to reverse directions. people are frightened of the unknown, and to many folks the words "nuclear" and "radioactivity" are HUGE unknowns. hence, the fight-or-flee meter tips heavily towards getting the hell out of Dodge. most everyone will jump in their cars and start driving. lots of folks will be driving around just to gather up their loved ones.

the last place you want to be is out in the open when fallout occurs. simply put, fallout begins when dust and dirt are swept up into the thermally-induced mushroom cloud and mixed with both unfissioned bomb material and fission by-products. over the course of the next few days, the wind-carried dust and dirt will settle back to the ground, carrying with it radioactive material. this radioactive material is the primary immediate danger to your health. however, due to the nature of the materials, the radioactivity will over time decay to safe levels. how long that takes is a function of several factors, but is generally on the order of 3 to 7 days. it is during this period that you need to be well insulated from the effects of the radioactivity. more on this later.

the good news is that if you survived the immediate effects of the detonation, namely the thermal pulse and the shock wave, with a little bit of preparation and lots of immediate action you can be 100% assured of surviving the fallout.

(2) because of several factors, stopping what you are doing to get wind direction information is unproductive. first, as may pilots will tell you, the direction of the wind near the ground and the direction of the wind at altitude are two different things. taking into consideration the height of the plume, there may in fact be three or more wind directions to account for. second, the wind data you receive from the internet or other automated sources may have been tainted by the detonation itself. third, because of the 3-7 day time period noted above, you can not know what the next week of weather will bring in terms of wind direction. and finally, many communications systems, including the telephone network and internet may be saturated by increased traffic. note that from all that i have read, ground level detonations do not produce appreciable EMP effects outside the damage area.

for these reasons, i don't suggest trying to "read the wind" and make ANY decisions based off of that data. the wind could be going a different direction at a higher altitude and/or the data could be suspect and/or the wind direction could change in the next day or two. all of this leads to the wind being a non-factor in your decision making process. someone in the gov't will be hard at work figuring out the fallout swath over the next 24 hours. i learned from one of the publications linked to below that work is not trivial to do. you can't do it at home, and if you are wrong you will end up radiation sick at best and dead at worst. btw if you still think prediction is easy, you have not read chapter 4 of this link (PDF is inside ZIP file).

so, step 2 is not to get wind data, but to gather everyone together, and calmly map out a plan which tasks everyone in your household with a specific activity toward surviving the fallout stage.

(3) a fallout shelter, if only improvised, is needed –– ASAP. as noted above, if you have a local shelter and your 3-7 days of supplies are easily mobile, you may decide to head that direction. not having a suitable basement in your house is one factor that may lead you to plan for this approach. for example –– up until recently, i worked just 7 miles from my house, and my place of employment had an underground basement fallout shelter. given that situation, i think i would have run a "5 minutes and we're gone, people" scenario with my family, bugging out with two vehicles loaded with supplies. my place of employment is familiar, the folks who potentially would hole up there are familiar, and it would not have been a stressful "Superdome" situation where i have to sleep with my Glock in one hand and with one eye open on my cases of water.

a true bug-in means you are going to have to either have a shelter already in place, or construct one on the fly. the shelter, ideally, shields you from the radioactive fallout by approximately 36" of earth, or 12" of concrete, or some combination thereof. moving this amount of material in a short period is impossible, so most shelter designs use as a starting point one or more basement walls, assuming the basement is below grade. there are several good guides on constructing makeshift shelters on the web. if nothing else, look at the pictures for good ideas.

the basics are that you need to put as much material as possible between you and the fallout, and the more dense that material is, the better. in the basement, move whatever you can to shield the shelter; for example, move the washer and dryer to help with shielding. fill the washer drum with water –– this will improve the shielding effectiveness dramatically. position your heavy toolchest to help block radiation. place unused water drums or cases of water around the perimeter of the shelter. red bricks, concrete blocks, belgian block, railroad timbers, stone, play sand, etc should be pulled from your yard and employed to help shield. place garbage cans outside the basement wall, fill them with water, and cover. push dirt over basement casement windows. on the floor above your shelter, put anything dense you can find.

protection from fallout is a three way problem: time, distance, and shielding. minimize the exposure time, maximize the distance, and maximize the shielding.

(4) food, water, sanitation –– for *at least* 7 days. you should be able to figure this part out. no doubt, you will be grimy after 7 days, that much is for sure.

(5) light and heat. again, you should be able to figure this out. there will be no sunlight in the shelter, artificial (battery or AC) light is all you will have. in the winter, a basement floor will soak heat out of you –– be careful of hypothermia.

(6) communications and power. at a bare minimum, an FM broadcast radio. keep in mind, the better you construct your fallout shelter, the harder it will be to get radio reception. if necessary, drop the downlead to a makeshift outside antenna through a basement window and into your shelter. hams, run the outside leads to your antennas past the shelter; worst case, you can snip the passing coax, improvise a connection, and use your radio(s) from within the shelter. if possible, wired or wireless internet into the shelter would be optimal.

empty every possible battery in the house into a box in the shelter. run an AC extension cord or two into the makeshift shelter.

(7) medications and first aid. KI pills. vitamin C. common cold products. basic FAK.

(8) IMPORTANT: DO NOT LEAVE THE SHELTER AT ANY TIME. radiation sickness is unkind.

wait. sleep. read. sing kumbaya. knit. eat sparingly. pee without splashing. shit without farting. do this for 7 days or base the duration on information you hear on the radio. most important, don't go nuts in the dark. try to maintain your bio clock –– up at 7am, do activities with some light, back to sleep at 9pm. this will keep everyone level-headed. hopefully the AC has stayed on, but careful use of LED lights should get you through the days.

i know it will be painful to hear unwanted activity above you in your house –– looters. they are fucked and will die. if they come down into the basement, have your wife cover your kid's ears. firing an AR15 or 9mm handgun indoors is extremely loud. only one looter will come down.

for this reason i suggest that you bar the doors behind you before sheltering in the basement. a 4 foot 2x4 with a V-cut on one end to fit the interior doorknob, and screwed to the floor on the other end will keep the door from swinging open no matter what is done to the lock. if possible, board up ground level windows.

(9) exfil from shelter, get information, evaluate local/regional/national situation. decide what to do next. WATER and FOOD are your first priorities.

(10) hug wife and kid(s). you made it.

––––––––––––––––

ps:

http://cisac.stanford.edu/publications/day_after_the_action_in_the_24_hours_following_a_nuclear_blast/ <––- A MUST READ, click PDF link at the bottom of the page.

FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
...
3. SHORT-TERM SHELTERING VERSUS PROMPT EVACUATION.
Fallout shelters deserve a comeback. Radioactivity, and in particular radioactive fallout, poses a problem peculiar to nuclear terrorism. For most people in the city struck, their best bet to avoid serious radiation exposure would be to shelter below ground for three or so days until radiation levels had subsided and only then to evacuate the area. The alternative – mass and chaotic evacuation during the time when radiation dose rates are greatest – would result in large and unnecessary additional loss of life over and above the fatalities due to immediate blast, fire, and close-in fallout. But while sheltering in place is the plan that would be optimal for most people, it would run counter to their strong impulse to flee the area. For a comparatively few people just downwind of the detonation, moreover, sheltering would not in fact offer enough protection, and their only chance would be to leave as soon as possible, as fallout takes a finite time to reach the ground.

Two distinct fallout regions can be expected. In the smaller, close-in “hot” fallout region the dose over time will be so high that most sheltering will not be effective and evacuation, dangerous as it is, should be attempted. That area is limited, however, to a few square miles in addition to the area affected by blast and fire. People in the hot zone should be advised to leave as soon as possible, preferably during the time before most of the fallout settles. But the great majority of the people will be outside the hot zone, and for them sheltering in place will be the safest course of action. In view of these facts, a new type of fallout shelter program – very different and much more practical than the 1950s-style civil defense program – should be promoted by the federal government as a cheap and effective way to minimize the radiation exposure of most people downwind of a nuclear terrorist attack. The Cold War “civil defense” shelter program was mocked because it could not offer realistic protection against an attack of thousands of warheads from the Soviet Union. But against one or a few terrorist nuclear weapons, sheltering in place is the best way for most people to protect themselves.

The rate at which people are exposed to radiation (the dose rate) subsides in inverse proportion to the time after the blast. People outside the immediate downwind hot zone will receive a smaller dose of radiation if they shelter themselves for a period of three days or so (the recommended sheltering period can be determined and communicated by federal authorities at the time). If they try to leave on the first day when the radiation is strongest, they will receive a larger dose because they will be exposed to intense radiation as they walk or wait in traffic on clogged roads to evacuate. Shelters that will only be occupied for a few days do not need to be equipped with large stocks of food, water, and other supplies.

The absence of the sheltering population from the highways will have another benefit: it will permit emergency workers and those who need to evacuate from the hot zone to move freely. A mass and confused exodus from the city will expose the fleeing population to unnecessarily high doses of radiation and impede the movement of emergency personnel. To avoid this, federal and state officials and first responders should work out ahead of time plans for determining which roads in the affected area should be closed to the public for three days and which should remain open and for how long.



http://www.survivalring.org/pdf/FEMA-H20-ProtectionInNuclearAge-1984.pdf <–– READ THIS TOO! simple, easy to follow, good stuff.

http://www.ki4u.com/free_book/s73p904.htm <––- excellent!

http://www.sew-lexicon.com/Fallout%20Protection%20Book/TOC_for_H-6.htm <––- also excellent!

http://www.stevespages.com/page7c.htm <––- see "Nuclear Contamination Avoidance" document FM 3-3-1

http://www.survivalring.org/pdf-index.htm <–– tons of good docs here.

http://www.nationalterroralert.com/emergency-preparedness-guides/

http://www.frfrogspad.com/disastr.htm

http://www.fema.gov/areyouready/nuclear_blast.shtm

shelter how-to's:
http://www.survivalring.org/pdf/H-12-1_Home_Shelter.pdf
http://www.survivalring.org/pdf/H-12-2_Aboveground_Home.pdf
http://www.survivalring.org/pdf/H-12-C_Basement_Fallout.pdf
http://www.survivalring.org/pdf/H-12-F_Basement_Lean-to.pdf

also see
http://www.oism.org/nwss/index.htm <–– Nuclear War
Survival Skills online book.

Quoted:







Yeah there's a couple types of nuclear attacks that are possible. Major ICBM attack, smaller "suitcase bomb" that is a low yield, and a dirty bomb. The first two, you're screwed if very close.

Quoted:
Well the FIRST thing to do in the way of PREPARATION is to LEAVE Los Angeles.
Immediately.
The only survivors  in Los Angeles  will be cockroaches.

Quoted:
I don't know if this has been discussed before, sorry if duplicated...  Please post link if so...

I live in Los Angeles, CA and have a question for those that are well prepared.  How do you prepare for a nuclear attack?  What have you got for preps?  What do you do when your town is attacked?  I know I can google this stuff, but wondering what the experts here on arfcom have to say.

thnx in advanced.

Quoted:
Read this for a look at what you can expect
RAND review

Quoted:
Not much prepping I can do for a nuclear attack. I live within a couple of miles of a major airforce base that would likely be an early target. I'd probably be vaporized before I knew what was coming.

Quoted:


The U.S. has a lot of "major" air bases (both on American soil and around the world) - and there are just a couple of hostile nations with enough nukes to strike more than a very small fraction of them.

Assuming that you're toast simply because you live near one of them - and failing to prepare as a consequence - could in itself be a fatal mistake.

Quoted:
Surviving a nuclear blast is easy - put distance between you and it ...  a thinking terrorist is more likely to blow up New York City, Philly, Boston, or Washington DC rather than Long Beach/Los Angeles. Most terrorist are Middle Eastern. Direct flights and ships are far more likely to land in an east coast port than west coast. The terrorist are likely to get one shot off, may be two or three, so they're going to have to aim them at the biggest targets - the President is number one along with Congress and the Supreme Court. Imagine a small 25 Kt device doing off on the Potomac near the Washington National Mall and a second one on the Hudson. Delivered by small boats launched from a larger trans-Atlantic ship it would be a bit of an effort but possible to slip by the Coast Guard.

Surviving nuclear fallout is a matter of putting mass between you and the source of the radiation. The more material the better. The heavier the material the better. The further you keep the fallout away from you the better. Worse case if fleeing the scene and getting caught in a car stuck on some highway. Best case is 20 feet under ground or deep in some underground parking garage. You need to shelter in place for as long as possible, drinking and eating only clean water and food, and breathing filtered air.  

Personally I think you're much more likely to see a massive biological attack launched in a couple dozen cities simultaneously. Cheaper, more effective, and almost as dramatic as a mushroom cloud rising over Houston.

Quoted:



But nuking LA would cause fall out to spread across the US, creating some serious secondary problems.  Wouldnt getting next to the coast while going north be your best bet if LA was nuked?  There would be allot of survivors, ut it would be litterly like a cross between Mad Max and Zombieland.  Distance would be your only salvation.

Quoted:

But nuking LA would cause fall out to spread across the US, creating some serious secondary problems.  Wouldnt getting next to the coast while going north be your best bet if LA was nuked?  There would be allot of survivors, ut it would be litterly like a cross between Mad Max and Zombieland.  Distance would be your only salvation.

Quoted:


The part in red is BS.  Fallout plumes are HIGHLY dependent on a large number of variables––yield, height of burst, wind speed, temperature, soil composition, current weather (rain will wash the fallout out of the air quicker), etc.  But, with that caveat, a 1Mt device popped over LA city center with a 30 mph wind straight out of the east would a produce a plume of 25 REMs max radiation that only extends east to Riverside––NOT all across the US.    I've said it before, I'm not THAT smart on the radiation effects, but IIRC 25 REM isn't enough to kill you unless you eat some fallout.  Oh, and nobody really uses 1Mt devices anymore, they're too big for most purposes.

Nukes are bad news, don't get me wrong––but they are simply a very efficient explosive with some interesting side effects, not a magic doomsday weapon.  

Quoted:



Ok I was just thinking back when St. Helens went up, it spread ash to Montana and parts of the Dakotas IIRC, (its been a while since i was in school, I sorta remember the news reports.)  Thats what I was making my unscientific post on.  It would cause MAJOR panic I would think all accross the fall out area, (thanks MSNBC, to keep the unfounded fear going)
Thanks for the correction.

Quoted:
I was watching this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xquFkjJ_hic

This morning and realized my preps lean too heavily on zombie attack. The likelyhood of having to shelter in place is much more realistic.  As is illustrated in that video, bugging out will not work for a variety of reasons.

Quoted:
When I lived in Commiefornia my bug out plan was to use a boat. My buddy had a sail boat that was big enough to hold several  people or a few people and a lot of supplies. There are also boat rental places out there as well. Just remember to stay below the water line until you are out of the danger area. This goes for any NBC event . Sail out to Catalina islands and plan your next move from there. In fact if you start hanging out small boat harbors you will notice little security and some very interesting boats for bugging out.
If you can fly your own plane I have seen people who own a plane on a as a group . If you belonged to one of these CO OPs you could bug out using the plane before the other members do the same thing.
As far as staying put in your home that is always best until you know what is happening and how to plan your way out. But I really don' t like most under groud shelter ideas because it limits my escape routes and my visibilty. I wouldn't want my bomb shelter to become a  tomb .
 One other idea that might work to bug out is a para glider or moterized parachute. They look like thay couldn't carry much but take offs and landings are on very short runways. Even at 40 MPH you will be making better time than people on the ground could hope for in such an event.

Quoted:
I disagree about D.C. being the smartest target for Terrorists.

I would agree with the RAND review that taking out the Port of LA or Long Beach would give a terrorist the most bang for his buck. Politicians can be replaced. NORTHCOM would still be in place to effectively manage the disaster.  Effectively destroying our ability to carry out global trade having lasting effect and cripple our ability to effectively project power overseas due to the financial harm suffered would do far more and still be an effective political statement.  

An attack on the Port of LA or Long Beach causes economic harm and gives them a high body count all with a very simple method of delivery. Having to take a nuclear weapon and drive it to a city is a bit more challenging than just shipping in a lead case in a shipping container with a timer GPS location activated detonator when few containers are screened.

Quoted:
I would have picked Houston because of its size would make it harder to identify the Nuke before it hit port and the area is critical to our fuel supplies. Even if the refineries weren't directly destroyed, it'd be a long time before they could be restarted. Washington DC will likely have very sensitive radiation detectors mounted in airplanes as politicians usually don't mind spending a lot of taxpayer money protecting themselves.

Quoted:
I printed the maps out and have them with some other stuff I printed for 'just in case'.  While I was reading up pn stuff, someone said it was good to print stuff off because if something did actually happen, you would not be assured to have access to information on line or any other methods.  So I try and print stuff off and keep it in a notebook.  Hope that is good advice for others.

Quoted:
While I'm no nuclear or terror expert, I doubt a full scale nuclear attack will happen, or even a large ballistic single detonation, because there would be swift and devastating retaliation.

The more likely scenario is like the video suggests a good sized dirty bomb, or very small nuclear detonation carried in by hand or truck.  Washington DC would be a logical target, but so would LA, Houston, or Chicago.  Terrorists are looking for mass casualties and recognition on a well known target.  Just think of the disruption to government if something happened to DC?  There would be a lot of chaos that would ring back to each and every state as they rush to establish new locations for operations and elect/appoint new representatives, let alone funerals in every state and the destruction of historical architecture.

Then again LA is a huge economic asset as well.  It is one of the "top spots" in entertainment, economics, and social status.  I don't think New York would be hit, as it would be a been there, done that deal, and "they" would want to show that they can do more than just hit the east coast.

A Jericho type event could certainly happen to a half dozen cities, but I bet the odds are more likely that a single target is more a realistic scenario.

It's a terrible thought regardless of magnitude or event, but I think the likely hood of having to bury ourselves under our basements for weeks is highly unlikely.

Quoted:


Just remember, a ballistic missle is a delivery vehicle- the warhead from which could be delivered in a pickup truck.  I really don't have a feel for how secure the FSU nuclear weapons are.  The media tends to blur radioactive material, different isotopes of uranium and plutotonium, and actual nuclear weapons.  But were the security to be lax, it would be possable to steal what ever the FSU's largest weapon was  (30 MT?).  And if it were stolen, the main buyer would be terrorist groups (nuclear envious states would be more likely to look for smaller devices that they could drop out of their planes, or put in a scud missle)  Besides which any wannabe nuclear power needs two weapons.

Then the explosion from such a bomb/warhead, is going to be a ground burst, which is what produces fallout (but less damage.)  Maybe a smaller, kiloton (or sub kiloton) device might be put in a cesna, or under 12,500 gross weight jet, but if a terrorist group ever gets a nuclear device into the US, I promise they aren't going to truck it to memphis, hijack a 747 freighter, carjack a K loader, and try to set off an airburst.

While I agree a dirty bomb is far more likely (the material is available in any small city, and on the side of the road at  large construction projects), it isn't possable to dismiss a nuclear weapon